


The Corner Piece

by tamerofdarkstars



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Clint helps, First Kiss, Fluff, Get Together, M/M, Phil tries to finish his puzzle book between missions, Puzzles, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-18
Updated: 2015-04-18
Packaged: 2018-03-23 15:16:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3773056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tamerofdarkstars/pseuds/tamerofdarkstars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A particularly determined thief with a purple ink pen keeps stealing Phil's puzzle book when he's not looking. Somehow, Phil's not super broken up about it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Corner Piece

**Author's Note:**

> Love these two and love this fandom. This is set in some ambiguous stretch of time before and after the events of the film.

It starts on a miserable, rain-drenched day in someplace he isn’t currently cleared to talk about. Phil is miserably hot, miserably sticky, miserably soaked completely through the three-piece he’s wearing. He’s sitting, cursing Nick with every fiber of his being for the glint in his eye when he’d dropped the mission files onto Phil’s desk a week previous, beneath a tent that’s doing about as good a job blocking the sun as it is blocking the humidity (that is to say, an absolutely terrible job. Phil wants with all his might to fire the tent) and trying not to sweat on his puzzle.

He’s failing spectacularly and the clues for 36 Across and 37 Down are melting together at an alarming rate.

“Sir.”

“Barton,” Phil answers him without looking up from his crossword, tapping his pen on his knee as he tries to think of a synonym for “cheap”. All that’s coming to mind are translations of the word cheap in the eight or so languages he knows, not counting dialects.

“We got movement.”

Phil carefully sets aside his crossword on the nearest surface that isn’t slick with condensation and picks up the radio, switching channels. “All units, stand by. What kind of movement, Barton?”

Somewhere, high above him, Phil knows Agent Clint Barton has been crouched in a tree with a romance novel and a bottle of water for the past fourteen hours, keeping watch on their drug lord through a scope more expensive than anything should be out here in this godforsaken jungle.

“The interesting kind, sir.”

Phil zooms in on the house through his equally as expensive binoculars and confirms that, yes, it is indeed exactly the kind of interesting incriminating movement they wanted.

“Barton, keep on him, but do not engage. All units, move in,” Phil is up and moving and he can almost _taste_ the end of this mission, it’s so close. He is _this_ close to air conditioning and a shower and there’s almost nothing else in the entire world he wants more.

“You sure, sir? I could pin him to the wall. Just for fun.” Barton’s voice is layered in heavy amusement, the kind he lays on thick so the junior agents will realize he’s kidding and stop marking addendums to their reports on his professionalism and Phil tilts his head up, just a bit, and allows his lips to twitch. It’s nothing – a bare fraction of a movement, but he knows Clint sees it because he hears his asset chuckle, low in his ear, even as Phil tells him in no uncertain terms is he to engage the mark, Barton, you are there for observation only.

Like he said. Almost nothing else in the world.

The bust is almost annoyingly routine for the stretch of time they had to spend camping in a jungle, and Phil is so caught up in the swirl of doing what he does best, that he doesn’t see Clint again until they’re on the jet.

Clint looks exhausted to nobody but Phil, who is able to see immediately through the casual posture to the tension in his shoulders and the droop of eyelids that take half a second longer than usual to open again after blinking. He sits next to him, carefully calculating the distance so Clint knows he sat there purposefully, but not close enough that their shoulders bump.

“Well done today, Barton,” He says, sitting back against the wall of the jet. The bench is uncomfortable and he makes a mental note among the thousands of mental notes he already has going to mark negatives in the transportation section of his report.

“Thank you, sir,” Clint rasps, voice more tired that his body shows, and Phil shoots him a glance.

“Sleep, Barton, you look like hell.”

“Ah, sir, I bet you say that to all the girls.”

Phil lets his lips more than twitch this time, since Clint is already sitting with his head back against the wall and his eyes shut and mentally curses himself, Nick Fury, Natasha Romanoff, and the half a dozen or so other people who were instrumental in bringing him into contact with the snoozing sniper.

Then he remembers his puzzle book and feels a bit disappointed. He must have left it in the jungle, wherever he’d tossed it. Phil clicks his tongue and tries to recall the puzzle so he can at least finish it by memory, if not on paper, when Clint rustles next to him, and something small and purple and damp lands in his lap.

Phil blinks at the puzzle book and then at Clint, who has now folded his arms defiantly across his chest. His eyes are still shut, but Phil knows Clint, has seen him in nearly every situation you could think of, and he knows when his agent is feigning sleep.

Phil smiles then, and, since no one is looking, lets up on the self-control just a tad so that some of the affection he feels blazing through him whenever he looks Clint’s way bleeds through his smile, just a bit. “Thanks. I was really looking forward to finishing that crossword.”

“Oops,” Clint murmurs, and half his mouth curls up into a smirk.

Phil flips the book open and yep, Clint’s already finished the puzzle, and signed it too, the bastard. He huffs in irritation, but Clint is snickering into his crossed arms, eyes still shut, and Phil just can’t dredge up the energy to be too upset right now.

“Sleep, Barton.”

“Yes, sir.”

\--

Phil quickly puts the crossword puzzle in the back of his mind – there were other things to occupy his attention. Like the ring of diamond smugglers in [REDACTED] that ended with a bullet in his left arm (and a word search done in mostly purple ink). Or the logic puzzle written out neatly in handwriting not his own after that thing with the arms dealer who tried to take Clint to bed and had to have an arrow removed from his… well.

Oh, and the Avengers Initiative. That distracted him for a bit.

So Phil doesn’t think of that first crossword at all as he reclines on the lawn chair, nose buried in a Sudoku puzzle. He scratches a number four into the upper right box and listens closely to the arguing couple behind him.

“… were supposed to get the girl at the reception!”

“Hey, it’s not my fault you’re shit at faking invitations!”

“Well, if we don’t manage to get her by noon, we’re both dead.”

“I know, I know! Fuck…”

Phil reached up and scratches his ear and speaks without moving his lips. “Did you get that?”

Across the pool, Clint doesn’t move from his post on the lifeguard stand. He’s sitting loosely, legs spread and a glob of white sunscreen on the tip of his nose beneath his sunglasses. The whistle glints against his chest as he surveys the pool area. “Loud and clear. Well, clear at least.”

Phil sighs into his puzzle, covering his mouth with his hand by scratching his nose. “Why can’t bumbling kidnappers do their work during business hours?”

On the lifeguard stand, Clint smothers a chuckle. Then he blows his whistle, sending a piercing feedback through Phil’s ear. Phil winces imperceptibly as Clint stands up on the ladder. “Hey! You! No running!”

Phil tries to disguise his laugh as a cough and fails miserably. He glances up at the ladder, breaking about a million different undercover protocols, but finding it difficult to care. Clint is grinning, openly, and hot affection licks Phil’s ribs.

Dying and coming back to life had shifted something fundamental at the core of their relationship. Sometimes, when days were long and nights were longer, when Phil could feel his scar burn across his chest, he thought of Clint, no matter how hard he tried not to, of the broken look on his ex-asset’s face, of the crushing hug that had pulled his stiches and put a hard lump in his throat.

They’d clung to each other like it was the last time, until Phil’s stitches threatened to give way and they were forced to let go, red-faced and clearing their throats.

You don’t go back to just asset-handler after that.

But, as his sisters continually liked to remind him at nearly every family function he managed to somehow attend, relationships were not his strong point. Of course, it certainly didn’t help that he worked for a secret government agency that stubbornly refused to exist. Or that the ever confident, cool, level-headed, capable Phil Coulson occasionally got nervous and sweaty when it came to navigating relationships. Particularly with extremely attractive smart-ass archers who tended to finish Phil’s puzzles and fall asleep in his office.

Phil ticks off another number in his Sudoku puzzle, completing a row, and watches as the kidnappers walk across his field of vision, heading for the pool gate. “Heading for the parking lot,” Phil murmurs, flicking his puzzle book shut and standing fluidly.

“Careful, sir,” Clint’s voice is light, almost casual, but the Phil lets it warm him anyway.

He leaves his puzzle book on the lawn chair and follows the kidnappers towards the parking lot, casually, wandering through gate. It’s hot in the parking lot, the sun reflecting off the asphalt, and Phil is sweating through his thin white t-shirt.

They’re quite a pair, both short and dark-haired, with matching scowls and flushes from the heat. Phil wanders towards them, keeping his pace purposefully easy. They’re arguing again, and Phil has to resist rolling his eyes. What a pair of bumbling idiot criminals. The only place Phil ever sees criminals this idiotic is in the pages of the trashy books Clint leaves all over his office.

Phil strides up behind the pair and waits.

It’s insanely easy – Phil has them behind the SUV and down for the count before either can get a word out.

The blow to the back of the head is a completely lucky shot, and Phil stumbles forward with an _oomph_ of air that leaves his system in a rush, hitting the SUV harder than he would have otherwise.

The third guy is taller that the other two, with a professional stance that screams ex-military and an angry glint in his eyes. Phil reacts instantly, time blurring into a series of reflexes and strikes and training. The guy is good and he’s not entirely recovered from, well, dying quite yet. The guy gets a strike in on Phil’s chest that explodes with pain, sending Phil rocking back against the SUV with a smothered grunt.

The guy smirks and steps in, fist cocked, when an arrow sprouts from his shoulder like a weed.

Phil blinks and there’s a moment where nothing happens. Then the guy swears, explosively, hand going up to scrabble at the arrow. Phil takes the opportunity and punches him in the face. The guy goes down like a bag of potatoes, falling on top of his partners in an unconscious heap.

Phil sighs and cracks his shoulder. His chest throbs unhappily as he lifts a hand to his ear. “Did you blow cover just to save my pride?”

“Of course not,” Clint’s voice is quiet, right behind him, and Phil turns to find Clint perched on top of the SUV, bow slung across his bare chest. It’s enough to kick his heart into overdrive and Phil’s extensive years of intense training are the only thing keeping his face straight as he stares up at his asset. He raises a smooth eyebrow.

“Where exactly were you keeping that?” he asks and is fully unprepared for the way Clint’s face splits into a beautiful cocky smile.

“Ah, sir. If you have to ask…” Clint winks and hops off the top of the SUV, pressing something into his hand. Phil looks down at the puzzle book, then back up at Clint, who’s already calling the op in. Phil doesn’t even protest that that’s _his_ job, because Clint has finished his puzzle _again_. When did he even find the time?

The numbers are filled in with purple ink and there’s Clint’s signature at the bottom, again, with a little flourish.

“When did you—?” He starts and then cuts himself off, digging in his bathing suit pocket for his pen, uncapping it with his teeth. Clint raises an eyebrow as Phil bends back the cover of the book and, using the SUV as a hard surface, scribbles his own signature underneath Clint’s.

“Sir?”

Phil smirks around the pen cap, letting it drop into his hand. “As I see it, Barton, you only managed to finish half the puzzle. I did the first half.”

Clint bursts out laughing, snatching the puzzle book from Phil. “Credit where credit is due, sir?”

“Absolutely,” Phil gives him a mock-stern look that doesn’t do a thing to erase the teasing gleam from Clint’s eyes.

For a stretched moment, they stand in the parking lot grinning at each other like fools. The pen in Phil’s hand is slick with sweat, and he knows he’s probably flushed with exertion, that his white t-shirt is probably stuck to him. Clint’s bow is probably going to leave a tan-line across his chest. They’re standing above three unconscious would-be kidnappers. It shouldn’t feel like the most romantic moment of Phil’s life.

After a beat, Clint’s grin fades to something softer and Phil feels his heart skip a beat. This is almost painfully unfair, to have Clint standing there smiling at him like that with the sun shimmering off the pavement.

Then Clint’s smile fades completely, to be replaced with something altogether more serious, and Phil wonders if this is it, this is the moment they’ve danced around for the last several years, but just as Clint opens his mouth, determination in every line on his face, SHIELD clean-up arrives in the form of two slick black non-descript vehicles.

Clint shuts his mouth and Phil curses in the private corner of his brain he’s reserved for things like that and turns to greet clean-up.

\--

It would stand to reason that just as Phil has convinced himself that maybe this Thing between them isn’t quite as one-sided as he’s assumed things would go to absolute hell only a week later.  He’s driving, splashing through mud and squinting through the rain, teeth gritted as he rattles over bumps.

“Barton, you still with me?” he barks.

The backseat is silent long enough for Phil to take a glance in the rearview. Barton is white, tight-lipped and bracing himself against the door, wincing over every bump. The blood on his shirt is darkening with every passing second and Phil’s heart is hard where it’s lodged in his throat.

“Have you reached her yet?” Barton asks and Phil returns his eyes to the road, hand already going up to his ear.

“Agent Romanoff, come in. Repeat. Agent Romanoff, status, now.”

But it’s the same as it’s been since they crossed the border – silent.

Clint groans as Phil hits a particularly nasty divot in the road, mud splashing up onto the windshield and struggles forward, hand landing on Phil’s shoulder.

Their pursuers are gaining on them and Phil grits his teeth. “Barton, don’t move, that’s an order.” The stitches he’d haphazardly sewn into the gash in Clint’s stomach were not his best, and were barely hospital quality, let alone up to pedal-to-the-floor escape tactics through a country without a proper road system.

But Clint ignores him, struggling into the front seat. Blood smears on the leather and Phil sucks in a breath, taking a hand off the wheel to touch Clint’s shoulder, gripping, feeling his ex-asset solidly under his fingers. Maybe it’s sentimental, maybe it’s revealing too much, but there‘s gunfire behind them and their car is flying faster than it had ever been built for and they still can’t reach Natasha – he affords himself the brief lapse in judgment.

“Barton, you alright?”

“Fine, sir, just drive,” Clint’s teeth are gritted but he doesn’t shrug Phil’s hand away. Phil is loathe when, after a few moments, he is forced to put both hands back on the wheel. If they get out of here in one piece…

There’s a burst of gunfire that sprays dirt everywhere and Phil jerks the wheel. If they get out of here in one piece, he is throwing Barton against the nearest wall and kissing the daylights out of him, regulations be damned.

The thought crystalizes in his mind in sudden vivid clarity and Phil tightens his jaw.

“Sir,” Clint’s voice is a rasp and it takes Phil a moment to answer as he forces the little car into a sharp turn, barreling off the road and down a hill. The car jerks and bounces and thunders down the slope, bottoming out at the base of the hill and spinning the wheels before it picks up enough traction to continue its mad dash to safety.

“Alright, Barton?”

“Fine,” Clint clears his throat, “but I think I got blood on your puzzle book.”

Phil is stunned into silence for a split second. “I’m sorry?”

Clint tosses the little purple book onto the dashboard, where it sits there like a beacon at the corner of Phil’s vision. He blinks, focusing on the drive, before he’s able to formulate a complete sentence.

“When,” he begins, wincing as he hits a particularly unfortunate bump, “did you _possibly_ find the time to—?”

“I didn’t finish the puzzle either,” Clint actually sounds disappointed and Phil doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

“There will be plenty of time for puzzles after we get out of this nightmare of a mission,” Phil says instead and Clint is quiet for a long stretched moment.

“Together?”

Machine gun rapid fire sounds behind them, fainter than it has been.

“What?”

“Would you want to,” Clint’s next breath is a little ragged, “maybe work on puzzles? Together.”

Phil takes his eyes off the road for a split second, shooting a tiny glance at Clint’s profile. The archer is bracing himself against the door, eyes focused on the road in front of them. His jaw is tight and Phil suddenly doesn’t know if it’s from the blood oozing from his chest or something else entirely. There’s something twisting in his stomach despite the danger they’re in – something strange and foreign, like a hope Phil hasn’t allowed himself to feel.

“I think,” Phil begins, slowly, thinking through his words as carefully as if he was handling something explosive, but before he can decide exactly what he wants to say, he’s interrupted.

_“Romanoff, checking in.”_

Natasha’s voice broke suddenly over their coms, as calm as if she’d just been to the grocery store rather than infiltrating a terrorist cell, and Phil’s throat closes swiftly as a dizzying wave of relief sweeps through him. Next to him, Clint lets out a strangled sigh.

“Agent Romanoff,” Phil all but barks, “coordinates. Now.”

Natasha gives them the coordinates and Phil makes a sharp turn exactly thirty-seven degrees due south.

It’s not until hours later, when they’re safely ensconced in the safe house, after check-in has been taken care of and SHIELD has been alerted as to the clean-up required, that Phil returns his attention to Clint’s words. Natasha has fixed Clint’s stitches with a practiced hand that Phil appreciates – he can stitch a wound shut, but not nearly as well as Natasha can, and has retired to catch a few hours rest.

_“Would you want to maybe work on puzzles? Together.”_

Phil’s fingers twitch against his thigh. He’s sitting in an old, sagging armchair in the corner of the room, breathing in and out and listening to the house creak. Clint is in the kitchen, sitting at the table. Phil can just see him around the edge of the wall.

The purple puzzle book is sitting on the side table next to Phil’s armchair. It’s water-damaged and a few of the pages are stained with blood. Clint’s blood.

Phil’s lips go tight and he grabs for the book, flipping through the puzzles. The first few pages are all his handwriting – a few logic puzzles, a crossword or two, Sudoku. Then that purple ink shows up, finishing his crossword from the jungle job all those months ago. His black pen is mixed with Clint’s purple ink for the next several puzzles, half and half. And Clint has signed every single one with a flourish.

Phil flips to the Sudoku from the kidnapping case a week ago, stares at their names signed one on top of the other and stands abruptly. He flips the pages quickly, before landing on a samurai Sudoku. Five puzzles total, spread out over two pages in one massive block.

Phil reaches up and loosens his tie, tugging the knot down. He pauses then pulls the tie completely off over his head, hanging it off the edge of the armchair. He strips off his jacket, draping it carefully and over the chair and rolls his sleeves up, undoing the top button at his collar.

He then squares his shoulders and heads for the kitchen.

Clint is sitting hunched at the table, eating a bowl of paste-like cereal with agonizing slowness. Phil just watches him for a second, watches the muscles in his shoulders move as he bends, to the bowl and then sits up again.

“Want some cereal?” Clint’s voice is low, husky, and Phil doesn’t jump. Obviously Clint heard him come in.

“I’ll pass,” he walks around the table and grabs the other chair, pulling it across the floor. It scrapes the tiles and Phil sits and looks at Clint. Really looks at him.

Clint looks worn – bags under his eyes and a tightness in his jaw – but the gauze around his chest is white and clean. His archer tosses him a half-smile, then bends his head for another bite of paste.

Phil _really_ wants to kiss him.

Instead, he tosses the purple book onto the table.

Clint stops chewing.

Phil waits.

Clint slowly lifts his head and looks at him.

Phil tries a smile. He feels it come out a little tentative, a lot unsure, sees his own hesitance reflected in Clint’s eyes.

Then Clint smiles and it’s like the goddamn sun breaking over the horizon.

“Did I see a samurai Sudoku?” he asks, shoving his bowl across the table, and Phil grins.

“Difficulty fiendish.” Phil leans back in his chair and uncaps his pen. Clint digs into his pocket and pulls out a purple felt tip and they bend over the puzzle book together.

It takes them the better part of an hour, mostly because they can’t stop _talking_. And it’s easy, effortless chatter, punctuated by the scratching of pens and the smothering of their laughter as they try not to wake Natasha.

Phil stretches across the table to ink in a nine in the upper corner just as Clint reaches for the box opposite to finish a row and suddenly their lips are millimeters apart. Clint is smiling, something happy and relaxed in his eyes and it’s the easiest thing in the world for Phil to close that distance and kiss him.

Clint relaxes into the kiss like they’ve kissed every day for the last forty years, and for a moment that lasts a millennium it’s sweet, gentle, perfect.

Then one of them shifts – Phil’s not sure who – and lips part and heat, white hot and strong, jolts through the kiss and suddenly it’s messy and hot and wet, teeth and tongue and nipping and gasping and the puzzle book slides from the table and hits the floor but neither notice, too wrapped up in each other.

Phil reaches for Clint, needing to feel, to touch, to reassure himself that his ex-asset is still there, still breathing. The memories of Clint clinging to the dashboard of the car, white-faced and covered in blood are still prevalent, burning red-hot in his mind. Clint makes a strangled noise into his mouth as Phil’s hand buries itself in Clint’s hair and leans forward, straining to get closer.

It’s the stifled gasp – pain, not pleasure – that punches through Phil’s hazy arousal. Clint’s pulled at his stitches and Phil puts a firm hand on his shoulder, disengaging himself from the kiss.

Clint’s eyes are huge and dark, barely a hint of their normal color ringed around wide pupils and Phil licks his lips. Clint lets out an unsteady breath.

For a moment, there’s silence. Phil can’t seem to form words – he’s wanted this, it seems like, for _so_ long without letting himself come anywhere near it that now that he’s finally kissed Clint Barton, he doesn’t know what to do.

Something bleeds into Clint’s eyes, then, as he stays silent. Something a little worried and a lot guilty and oh, hell no. Phil leans forward. “How’re your stitches?”

His voice is thick and Clint’s eyes flick to his lips and back again. He shrugs, wincing slightly and Phil stands half out of his chair, reaching for him.

“Clint,” he says, seriously, “we need to get one thing clear.”

Clint presses his lips together tightly, like he doesn’t expect Phil’s next words to do anything but hurt.

“I want this,” he says clearly, looking directly into Clint’s eyes, “I have wanted this and I want this and I will still want this when I’m eighty-seven and I can’t walk more than a mile at a time.”

Clint is still and silent, listening.

“But,” Phil continues, putting a hand on Clint’s cheek and swiping across smooth skin with the pad of his thumb. Clint shudders and Phil resists the sudden jolt of energy that is demanding that Phil kiss his ex-asset right that second, “ _but_ , I’m not doing this while you’re in pain. And as much as I’d love to keep going—”

But Clint is leaning forward again, as far as he can without pulling on his stitches, and catching Phil’s lips softly, sweetly, lingering for a second before pulling back.

“I guess I’ve waited this long,” Clint says, and his voice is so quiet Phil has to lean closer to hear him. “What’s a few more weeks?”

He grins and Phil grins back.

\--

“No, but seriously, Tash, they can’t really keep me here for _week_ s, can they?” Clint whines and Natasha whacks him with her paperback, leaning back into the little plastic chair.

“Stop getting horribly injured in away missions and you wouldn’t have this problem,” she says pointedly, and Clint sticks his tongue out at her.

“Now, now children.” Phil leans against the doorframe and his assassins look up at him in unison. Natasha smiles, standing in one smooth liquid motion and kisses Clint on the forehead. Then she crosses the room and kisses Phil on the cheek.

Then she’s gone and Phil and Clint are alone in the infirmary room. Phil loosens his tie and Clint’s eyes crinkle at the corners.

“Did you bring it?”

Phil waves the little purple book and crosses the room, pulling Natasha’s abandoned chair closer to the bed and opening the book. “Logic puzzles today?”

“Sure,” Clint tips his chin hopefully and Phil resists for maybe ten seconds before he shifts forward in the chair and kisses him.

They pull apart after a long minute, breath mingling between lips hot with friction, and Clint sighs. “Weeks, you said?”

Phil kisses him quickly, just a peck, and sits back in the chair. “Get well soon,” he says mildly and the laugh he gets is sunshine incarnate.  


End file.
